Strong Cities Network Should Raise Alarms for Liberty Advocates

The Obama administration and U.S. Justice Department promoting foreign “best practices” (along with documented current practices of conflating defenders of traditional values with violent extremists), ought to inspire Liberty advocates into showing some resilience of their own. –Strong Cities Network website screenshot

Attorney General Loretta Lynch and the Department of Justice are joining with an international law enforcement coalition for the claimed purpose of “strengthen[ing] community resilience against violent extremism,” a Sept. 28 release from the DOJ’s Office of Public Affairs announced.

“The Strong Cities Network will serve as a vital tool to strengthen capacity-building and improve collaboration,” Lynch proclaimed for the United Nations SCN launch. “As we continue to counter a range of domestic and global terror threats, this innovative platform will enable cities to learn from one another, to develop best practices and to build social cohesion and community resilience here at home and around the world.”

Curious, that she deliberately chose the word “collaboration.” And as for “best practices,” we have them already, in the Constitution, with its Bill of Rights that she swore an oath to uphold. And that’s just the start of the flags this globalist venture ought to be raising.

To paraphrase another miserable oath-breaker, Bill Clinton, it depends on what the meaning of the word “extremism” is. As Oath Keepers and other Constitutionalist/traditional values groups have seen time and again, the Feds are more than happy to embrace the Southern Poverty Law Center’s politically-motivated insinuations. Speaking out in defense of traditional marriage or opposing “progressive” usurpation of powers results in being conflated with truly violent and racist groups, being smeared with the label of “hater,” and being held up as examples for law enforcement fusion centers to be on the lookout for.

So it’s no wonder that the “American” cities that are prominent SCN members are also all members of Michael Bloomberg’s mayor’s coalition … uh … collaboration, beginning with New York City, headed by socialist revolutionary Bill De Blasio. And it’s no wonder that the remainder includes no shortage of degenerate kleptocracies, third-rate tyrannies, and cartel/terror havens, many meriting State Department travel warnings (which in a rational world would begin with “Are you nuts?”).

I’m sure there are plenty of “best practices” Lynch et al. could pick up from “strong cities” like Medellin or Tunis. And I’m equally sure the “welcoming” support given by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, will help with the SNC mantra “that violent extremism and prevention efforts should not be associated with any particular religion, nationality or ethnic group.”

As an aside, a truism that manifests itself in practically everything they do is that with “progressives,” every day is Opposite Day. So it figures the guy kicking off the launch on American soil is “royalty.” And speaking of “progress,” recall what Thomas Paine said about hereditary political titles centuries ago:

[T]he idea of hereditary legislators is as inconsistent as that of hereditary judges or hereditary juries; and as absurd as an hereditary mathematician, or an hereditary wise man; and as ridiculous as an hereditary poet-laureate.

Essentially, Strong Cities Network looks at this stage to be a PR boondoggle, allowing globalist bureaucrats and diplomats to go on all-expense paid junkets, conferences, dinners and receptions on the tax cows’ dollar or Euro. But it has the potential to grow into something much more insidious, and that’s where what it doesn’t tell us about the information it will be sharing, and about “best practices,” becomes exploration-worthy.

Assuming the “intelligence” will be ultimately exploitable to build cases involving U.S. citizens, what assurances are there that it will be gained in accordance with individual protections mandated in the Bill of Rights? Not to cast aspersions on member cities like Beirut, but just what “best practices” are acceptable, and will the representatives of our people, that would be the Congress, have unfettered oversight of the process? What further protections will there be against foreign law influencing decisions required to comport with “the supreme Law of the Land,” something more than one “progressive” Supreme Court Justice has expressed an interest in considering flexible?

There’s another, much more basic and seemingly mundane question that we could be pressing for an immediate answer to, and we don’t need to wait for anyone else to ask on our behalf: Why is the Strong Cities Network website, linked to by Attorney General Loretta Lynch in an official Department of Justice media release, anonymously registered? What’s with some unknown entity contracting with Domains By Proxy, LLC, out of Scottsdale, Arizona, instead of just being up front about who’s paying for it? I’d say something about Obama’s “most transparent administration in history,” but we’ve already talked about “progressives” and Opposite Day earlier in this piece.

Me (and again, speaking for myself—just in case “progressive” media wants to get it wrong again), I’m going to ask DOJ about that and also contact the House Oversight Committee with my concerns. I’m also going to be watching for cities thinking about joining the “collaboration” and raising these concerns when I find out about them.

About Author

David Codrea blogs at The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance (WarOnGuns.com), and is a field editor/columnist for GUNS Magazine. Named “Journalist of the Year” in 2011 by the Second Amendment Foundation for his groundbreaking work on the “Fast and Furious” ATF “gunwalking” scandal, he is a frequent event speaker and guest on national radio and television programs.

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